“Startup Nation” Unites the Israeli and South Florida High-Tech Industry2018 conference highlights emerging trends in cybersecurity, artificial intelligence and more

South Florida and Israeli entrepreneurs will unite at Miami Dade College, Wolfson Campus on Feb. 26-27, 2018 for the Startup Nation Conference, a meeting of creative thinkers, business owners and MDC students that will highlight innovation and emerging trends in the high-tech industry.

Building on the success of the inaugural conference in 2016, this year’s event hosted by The Idea Center at MDC, Wolfson Campus in partnership with the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation will delve into practical applications and technical advances involving artificial intelligence, augmented and virtual reality, and cybersecurity.

“The 2018 conference will give more visibility to fast-growing South Florida companies and encourage more student participation,” said Romi Bhatia, executive director of the The Idea Center. “We are looking at where growth is happening and bringing Miami startups and entrepreneurs to the forefront.”

The inaugural Startup Nation Conference hosted more than 300 attendees and featured top Israeli entrepreneurs, including Ben Enosh, co-founder and chief revenue officer at Audioburst, a company organizing the world’s audio information; Danny Weissberg, co-founder and CEO of Voiceitt, the company behind Talkitt, an app that allows individuals with motor and speech disorders to communicate with their own voice; and Liat Sade-Sternberg, CEO of Fusic, a social music video platform.

The conference was born from a memorandum of understanding signed by MDC’s Idea Center and the Tel Aviv University Entrepreneurship Center in 2015. The agreement was intended to connect Israel’s high-tech and startup communities with resources and entrepreneurs in Miami.

Both Israel and South Florida are home to some of the world’s most vibrant innovation hubs. The Economist magazine reports that Israel, a small country of 8 million people, boasts the largest number of internet startups per capita in the world. In 2017, the Miami-Fort Lauderdale area ranked first among 40 of the largest metro areas in the U.S. for new startup activity.